Words by Shayni Solanki
With the launch of Fenty Beauty in 2017, Rihanna breathed new life into a stale industry, releasing 40 shades of foundation in the very first launch.
Before Fenty Beauty, we were all used to a standard foundation launch usually comprised of 25 shades heavily made up of lighter shades. Most of the time, the medium to dark shades included in the launch were imperfect. This was the status quo for years, until Rihanna launched Fenty Beauty.
When Fenty dropped their first-ever foundation range in 2017, it debuted with 40 different shades. The Pro Filt’r foundation was revolutionary: the range was beautiful. The launch was unprecedented at the time for not only its inclusion of 40 shades, but the sheer variety also. From the beginning, the brand has catered to all skin tones, seamlessly transitioning from the lightest to the darkest shades, creating something for everyone.
When Fenty Beauty first dropped, there was a palpable response on YouTube. Nearly 5 years ago, beauty YouTuber Nyma Tang posted an emotional video of her first try using Fenty Beauty foundation. At the time, companies weren’t catering to a range of dark skin tones, and finding a perfect match in foundation was a nigh impossible task for so many. After so many years of having to mix different brands’ foundations, makeup users finally had something reliable.
Fenty Beauty’s debut launch was so successful that the foundation shade range subsequently expanded to 50 shades. Rihanna made her mission statement clear: “there needs to be something for a dark-skinned girl; there needs to be something for a really pale girl; there needs to be something in-between”.
Elle magazine pointed out that beauty brands are now tend to launch with 40 foundation shades minimum. They labelled it “The Fenty Effect”. There are no more excuses left to be made. Rihanna proved that makeup brands are perfectly capable of releasing darker shades in the first launch. After its debut, Fenty Beauty truly became the standard for all makeup launches.
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